IEEE 488
IEEE 488
(hardware, standard)The IEEE-488 standard was proposed by Hewlett-Packard in thelate 1970s and has undergone a couple of revisions. HPdocumentation (including data sheets and manuals) calls itHP-IB, or Hewlett-Packard Interface Bus.
It allows up to 15 intelligent devices to share a single bus,with the slowest device participating in the control and datatransfer handshakes to drive the speed of the transaction.The maximum data rate is about one megabit per second.
Other standards committees have adopted HP-IB (AmericanStandards Institute with ANSI Standard MC 1.1 andInternational Electro-technical Commission with IECPublication 625-1).
To paraphrase from the HP 1989 Test & Measurement Catalog (the50th Anniversary version): The HP-IB has a party-linestructure wherein all devices on the bus are connected inparallel. The 16 signal lines within the passiveinterconnecting HP-IB (IEEE-488) cable are grouped into threeclusters according to their functions (Data Bus, Data ByteTransfer Control Bus, General Interface Management Bus).
In June 1987 the IEEE approved a new standard for programmableinstruments called IEEE Std. 488.2-1987 Codes, Formats,Protocols, and Common Commands. It works with the IEEEStandard Digital Interface for Programmable Instrumentation,IEEE 488-1978 (now 488.1). HP-IB is Hewlett-Packard'simplementation of IEEE 488.1.